Your bounty. The Shutdown Fullback has been created. Don't click it if you can't take jokes about Lloyd Carr's inability to gameplan from a Florida fan who clearly filed the most recent matchup of the two teams under "LSD-induced hallucination."

My name is Orson Swindle I have taken LSD Lloyd Carr is beating Tim Tebow by running a wide-open spread offense

PLEASE HELP ME

I mean… yeah. I get it.

Anyway:

Jason Kirk has started making meth with a former student of his. That is all.

That's not all. Final total for M: $6,316. Second place: Georgia with $1,318. OSU: $250. Rest of Big Ten combined: $600.

Everyone hates it. Literally the only positive response to the Big Ten's recent smoochy session with the Rose Bowl I can find: Drew Sharp [for the love of God, don't click that]. That's when you know you've made a bad life decision. Drumroll…

Kyle Meinke opens with "all due respect, but have you lost your mind" and doesn't back off much from there:

"I’m a big advocate for playing as many games as possible on campus, but I’m also a realist to know when you get to the point where you got those kinds of national games, with teams coming to various regions of the country, playing outdoors in the Midwest in January probably is not going to be a salable option," he said.

Right. Because Lambeau Field and Soldier Field and Gillette Stadium and MetLife Stadium have such a hard time drawing fans for December and January games.

Of course, Delany revealed minutes later the Big Ten is interested in adding the Pinstripe Bowl to its postseason slate -- a game that's played in late December in New York City. So, apparently the Big Ten doesn't mind playing postseason games in the cold, as long as they're not playoff games.

And what about all the fans, who likely will be asked to travel to a Big Ten championship game, national semifinal and national title game within the span of a month?

If you were to ask me why Jim Delany and the Big Ten brass have, essentially, given up without a fight to be able to host semi-final playoff games on college campuses – I would not have a coherent answer for you.

Corn Nation, which doesn't have the lingering fondness of a Big Ten tradition:

I hate the Rose Bowl. I hated it before we joined the Big Ten, I hated it last year, and I'm going to hate it even more now. I don't want a college playoff system if it includes the existing bowl system. I don't care about Rose Bowl tradition.

I wanted to see a SEC team play in freezing temperatures in the snow some day before I die. Now it looks like I'm just going to have to live forever. Bastards.

Yesterday, Michigan State's athletic director, Mark Hollis, informed us peasants about the death of on-campus semi-final games. The "value" of the Rose Bowl has to be maintained, you see. I guess I'm not surprised fossils are defending other fossils which make them money. It's a hell of a ruse, and I guess in the end, I have to tip my cap and wait for the Grim Reaper to do what he does.

To hide behind the fallacy that elite B1G teams set the Rose Bowl as their ultimate goal is a joke. That joke becomes the kind you don't deliver in front of women and children when you basically go out of your way to disadvantage your own teams by not pushing for warm climate schools to possibly play big boy football in football weather.

As icing on the cake, the decision makers put an even greater financial burden on fans who will be racking up a lot more air miles with no chance of a home semifinal or at least a semifinal potentially located within the conference footprint.

With self inflicted decisions like this, it's not hard to understand why the B1G struggles to be elite on the gridiron. But hey, at least we still have the Rose Bowl tradition.

I give up. These guys really are that dumb. If I were the folks at ESPN, once I got them signed on the dotted line for the next postseason TV deal, I’d invite ‘em all over for a friendly game of poker. There’s no reason to leave them with any money in their wallets.

There was also the Wetzel piece, a Holdin' The Rope bit, and a bunch of other stuff I could keep linking for days. Everyone hates the Big Ten's meek-shall-inherit act.

"I would rather have neutral sites," Meyer said. "I'm not sure you can, on a crisp December day here in Columbus, have a Southern team come up to play. The Southern teams I coached [at Florida], I know it would be a problem."

"I think there are two issues," Brandon said Wednesday after meetings with conference AD's wrapped up. "One is the salability of that to the other conferences in terms of whether that is a fair fight to bring somebody up in the snow of January from the South. Whatever system we come up with it has to be agreed to by everybody, so that is the practical reality."

ARGHHHHHHHH (The other issue is that players like free vacations.)

In other bowl news. The Big Ten is thinking about diversifying its bowl locations. Right now there's the Rose and then Florida Florida Florida Florida. Delany:

"When you have three bowls in Florida and you're a school that is constantly in that range for selection, your fan base could end up, in a five-year period, four times in the state of Florida," Delany said. "So does that depress the interest? Again, sometimes less is more. Is there a way to give them a taste of Florida and Phoenix and Texas and other places in California? We want to have the fan base excited about going, about who they're playing and about where they're playing.

Delany said they'd be interested in the Pinstripe Bowl in New York—probably the least-embarrassingly-named minor bowl around—and Graham Couch, the author of the above-linked piece, speculates that the Big Ten would like to move in on California bowls like the Holiday and the Fight Hunger Bowl. You may remember the latter as the host of the saddest game in the history of college football (Illinois-UCLA, featuring two fired coaches and zero winning records), but it's in San Francisco so at least it's somewhere interesting. I said my bit on this already; diversity is good, they should put one in Denver. Average temps there in January are in the 40s. Not exactly Frozen Tundra.

Minor violations ahoy. Another minor avalanche of secondary violations from OSU contains little of note except another screwup from Gene Smith, but I want to point out this guy:

…assistant coach Mike Vrabel [was] using smokeless tobacco on the sidelines during football games last season, which was noted and reported to Ohio State by a Columbus-area health teacher, and was a secondary violation of NCAA rules against using tobacco during games or practice.

Of course the guy ratting on Vrabel is a high school health teacher. Now let me tell you about these sexually transmitted diseases. Remember, kids, everything is going to kill you. Now read a book or die.

BONUS: article features Only Lawyer In America Michael Buckner.

"In general, if you're not reporting numerous secondary violations, then from the NCAA perspective, that could be considered a bad sign," Buckner said.

Someone find another lawyer. Surely we must have a second somewhere in this country.

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Let's just come out and say it: How is the status quo/near-future of college football not supported by illegal kickbacks or some other financial shadiness involving the blazer-adorned bowl buffoons and conference leadership?

Maybe it's because those making the decisions never have to pay to go to a bowl game. Of course Tom Osborne wants to protect the bowls, they were nice experiences for him when he was coaching (well at least once Nebraska started winning them) and as AD he's never had to pay his own way or faced a situation where the AD he oversees has failed to sell its tickets and has lost substantial amounts of money.

guh

Why start at 35? Lots of students (you know, the supposed beneficiaries of college athletics and also the loudest fans) and young fans would love to see a playoff game and not have to pay thousands in short notice travel costs

From now on, whenever this home game issue comes up, I will recall Urban's quote and just be unable to speak or think clearly.

I mean, WTF Urbz???? That's the reason you want the game up North. And why would you make that statement now? You're in flippin' OHIO, buddy?

Unless, he too is pissed at Delaney for blowing what he, more than anyone else, knows could be a huge advantage. Maybe, just maybe, this is his way of mocking Delaney and the Big Ten. If so, I actually . . . . well . . . think that . . . it is . . . pretty clever of him and I . . . well . . . I agree with him and appreciate him for saying it. Now I feel dirty and am back to not being able to speak or think clearly. Excuse while I bang my head against this wall.

“Your satisfaction lies in your illusions/ But your delusions are yours and not mine”

I don't like these damn gimmicks, used to be, the debates before the game surrounded which team was better, not how much money each team would make for playing or if Muffy would be forced to wear a jacket while walking from the limo to the suite. The spirit of the game seems to be diminishing.

I don't think that New York makes any sense at all (at least as the "home" site of playoff game. It's not even in the B1G footprint! Penn State is probably the only school within 500 miles. Chicago, maybe. New York, not even close.

I don't think that New York makes any sense at all (at least as the "home" site of playoff game. It's not even in the B1G footprint! Penn State is probably the only school within 500 miles. Chicago, maybe. New York, not even close.

... three major airports, more cabs than people and a zillion hotels. Also, anecdotally, while the region gets nasty weather aplenty, the city itself generates enough heat that snow in other places is often rain in the city.

Compare that with trying to fly into Detroit in a snowstorm - if they think they can't land, they won't take off in the first place. Going to New York it's very likely they can land somewhere.

None of which is to say that any of this is best for Big Ten football or its fans, only that there are reasons that a bowl game in New York can be sold where a playoff game in The Big House can't.

But it sounds pretty bad. I wouldn't mind seeing them get teams going back to the Holiday. A couple in Cali, a couple in Florida, and a couple in the Southwest. It's amazing how as we've gone along the bowl tie-in's seem to get worse.

The Big Ten use to have affiliations with the Holiday Bowl (San Diego), the Insight Bowl (Tempe, I think), Alamo Bowl (San Antonio) and whatever the game in El Paso was.

Maybe those aren't great locations but they are also places that I would be unlikely to visit except for a bowl game. So in a backwards sort of way, that makes them womewhat exotic to me. Compared to the current lineup which is just a bunch of Florida, Florida, Florida after the Rose Bowl and they're right, it does become a bit redundant.

I've been to one Rose Bowl. It was nice -- damn you, Vince Young -- but not anything worth throwing away a shot at a logical playoff system for.

Anyway, the Rose Bowl died in 2006, on the day where Michigan played Ohio for the right to avoid going to Pasadena. I doubt there's a single person reading this blog who felt good about that trip, or who didn't spend the next two weeks cursing the polls and Gary Danielson as Florida received a gift national championship shot.

Who said Michigan and Ohio State were playing to avoid the Rose Bowl that day? If you watch the game closely, it was obvious that both teams were trying to lose that game in order to get to the Rose Bowl.

If American history can teach us anything, it is that the Southern states do not perform well when above the Mason-Dixon line. I.e. Gettysburg. It would behoove us to have them come up here and play in December and January.

I think we all knew from the beginning that having semi-final games take place on campuses was far too good of an idea for the NCAA to ever adopt.

I've written this in the comments before, it will always bug and baffle me how much the schools bend over for the bowls. How does Alabama not love the idea of making any school from any state come to Tuscaloosa to play a semi-final playoff game?

I think everyone's generally overreacting to the Big Ten backing off the proposition of playoff home games. It looks to me like the Big Ten was pushing for it, and literally everyone else was violently opposed (for obvious reasons).

The Big Ten found itself pushing a position that had zero chance of succeeding, they knew it, and everyone else at the negotiating table knew it. When you're in that situation, you back off and make your stand somewhere that you might actually make up some ground. While playing a semi final in the Rose bowl is way worse than home games, it's still better than a rotating slate of NFL Stadiums in the Southeast, which is the only other place this could really have gone.

All the posturing afterward is clearly disingenuous, but that's what ADs and Conference Commissioners are for: spouting PR nonsense.

It's not better than a rotation of NFL stadiums that includes Indy/St. Louis/Minneapolis/Detroit. If those sites can host a Super Bowl or a final four, there's zero reason why the can't also host college football playoff games. There hasn't been a remotely compelling reason why it couldn't work other than the SEC/Pac-12 not wanting to give up their natural advantage.

There hasn't been a remotely compelling reason why it couldn't work other than the SEC/Pac-12 not wanting to give up their natural advantage.

That's the only reason there needs to be. Every single conference other than the Big Ten generally enjoys a location advantage in their bowl games. Everyone involved in this negotiation is looking out for themselves. That's why the Big Ten wanted home games in the first place.

The current bowl system benefits everyone other than the Big Ten, so every conference is going to stand up to protect it. It sucks, but it doesn't make sense to criticize the Big Ten for giving in. If they'd put up a fight they still would have lost, looked like petulant children, and lost any other bargaining power they might have had.

I saw somewhere that Deloss Dodds favors neutral site playoff games outside the traditional bowl structure, thus the Big 12 does as well (Texas = Big 12). That's one group on our side. The ACC souldn't mind having a game in Atlanta or Charlotte. I don't see why they would be opposed. The Big East .... hahaha, just kidding, they don't matter.

If it wasn't for the Big Ten's insistence on maintaining the Rose Bowl, there would be only two conferences supportive of bowl sites only. Once you get to neutral sites, they can be anywhere. It's inexcusable that the Big Tem ceded this point so easily.

I still think the "maintaining the Rose Bowl" crap was just the line they went to to make it seem like the deal that we're stuck with is "Totally the one we wanted all along!"

If they could have swung Indy or Detroit or Minneapolis as the site for any #1 or #2 ranked Big Ten team in a playoff, then obviously they should have. But I still get the feeling that was never a real possibility.

I just don't think you can say "nobody would agree." It doesn't seem like we even pushed, despite there being parties that should theoretically favor at least rotating semifinal sites out of the current four locations. For a good portion of the ACC, none of the bowl sites are really a drive. For the Pacific Northwest schools of the Pac 12, once you leave LA, it's all pretty much the same. The Big 12 base would love to occasionally have a game in Dallas. To me, it seems like it's pretty much just the SEC and the southern portion of the Pac 12 that would have incentive to really fight for the traditional bowl sites.

If the ADs/Commissioners didn't care about protecting the existing bowls, I am sure an agreement could have been made where each conference gets to designate a "host" site if that conference's representative is 1 or 2.

To be fair, I'm basing my assumptions entirely off of "What would I want if I was in conference X."

The ACC might have reason to get behind nuetral sites, but the entirety of the Pac 12 and SEC would be against it, and I would image the Big 12 would be as well (especially Texas, and even Oklahoma, and after that the Big 12 doesn't listen to anyone's opinion).

You specify the Southern Pac 12. But imagine you're Oregon. Under the bowl system, you play on the West Coast if you're the home seed, AND if your're the away seed playing a Big Ten team. If it's nuetral sites, suddenly you're traveling to the Midwest to play that Big Ten team.

The same is true for just about everyone else except maybe the ACC (although I doubt the Southern powers in the ACC would be very happy about traveling north in January, even if the game was indoors). Moving to nuetral sites might get them slightly closer to home when they're the home seed, but would likely put them much farther away from home if they're the away seed.

If the Big Ten indeed has to give up on home sites because nobody else is going to agree to it THEN GET SOMETHING OUT OF IT. HInt: Its not the Rose Bowl. Nobody cares if we host a game in the Rose Bowl or not. The other conferences are not giving up anything.

If nothing else, then at least scream from the rooftops: "LET IT BE KNOWN FOREVERMORE: TEAMS FROM THE SOUTH ARE OFFICIALLY AFRAID TO PLAY FOOTBALL IN REAL WEATHER. THEY HAD A CHANCE TO PROVE THEMSELVES BUT THEY RAN AND HID."

Delaney may be too polite to point it out, but we're certainly not. Next time some SEC slappy gets on the B1G about being slow or whatever, smack them in the face with how the SEC ran and hid under the blankets at the threat of having to play football in the elements.

Exactly. There's no reason why the sites that host the conference championship games can't be used to host the semis. It may not be as good as a true home game for fans, but at least Indy is within the B1G footprint.

You make it sound like the Big Ten could have actually made a difference by flat out refusing to agree to the terms. All that would have happened is the negotiations would continue without the Big Ten's input, and then when the playoffs were created, the Big Ten would likely not participate. It's happened before, see "Bowl Allience."

As for forcing a concession, they've still got time. There are many more details to be decided, and by bowing out gracefully and not putting up a big fight and creating PR problems, the Big Ten has maintained almost all of its bargaining power.

They've given up their one bargaining chip and have received nothing in return. It has zero power now. They're just along for the ride now. They have nothing to give, and there's no reason for anyone to give them a thing.